It’s been forever since I did a Sunday Takeaway. We’ve been going over church doctrine – why we believe what we believe – and while it’s been a good study and I’ve learned many things, I felt like I would have to repeat the whole sermon to reflect on it. Pastor built on each point in such a way it was hard to paraphrase. I might still hit some highlights in a later post.
Do you know what your church doctrine is? What your church believes? Does it come from scripture? Can it be backed up? I encourage you to find out!
Today we started an expository look at Acts. This just means we will be looking at the book of Acts in a very detailed way and examine what it means. There are 28 chapters in Acts so we could be here a while! I’ve been in Acts in my daily reading so this fits right in.
What I never considered was how Pastor introduced the book today – “Acts – the Sequel.” Sequel? Sequel to what? Acts is actually a sequel in many ways to the book of Luke. Acts picks up where Luke left off. What happens after Jesus ascends into heaven? What happens to the disciples? Do they go back to their jobs? What happens to the church and the people who followed Jesus? If you think about it, Luke can be quite the cliffhanger!
A couple of facts that Pastor brought out (where does he find this stuff?) that interested me today; Luke and Acts take up 1/4 of the New Testament. If you think Paul’s letters take up a lot a space, think about how much of the New Testament Luke wrote. Luke covers the 30 years from Jesus’s birth to his ascension into heaven. Acts covers the next 30 years. Jesus went up in Luke and the Holy Spirit came down in Acts. It was really quite an interesting introduction.
This also answered a question I had had from my daily Bible reading – who traveled with Paul to Rome? As I’m reading the account of the journey it keeps saying, “We sailed..” who is we? Who is giving the account? Our course, when I finish my reading each day I’m off to get ready for work and I wasn’t taking time to look it up. It was nice to have that cleared up. I can continue reading knowing the answer to the question.
How’s your daily Bible reading coming? Are you sticking with it? We are halfway through the year – it’s never too late to start! I’m really enjoying the One Year Bible and plan on staying with it. I am still planning on reading it next year too just in a different version.
Have a great week! Let me know if any of this was new to you today.
Diffusing Hope 